A Rogue Ex-Hialeah Cop Wants Katharine Cue's Seat

Apparently Daniel Bolaños hopes Hialeah voters have a short memory or don't care about his checkered past. How else can one explain why the disgraced former cop is running for a seat on the city council?

He is challenging councilwoman Katharine Cue, who was appointed to the council late last year despite documentation indicating she was not a Hialeah resident at the time she was selected.

In 1998, a Hialeah man accused Bolañosand his brother Rolando Jr. of taking him to a parking lot and beating him up. He was just one of eight alleged victims who claimed the Bolaños brothers assaulted them.

What made the brothers' behavior even more appalling was that their father, Rolando Sr., was the city's police chief -- who broke the spirit of the state's anti-nepotism laws by constantly having his subordinates cover for his sons.

Although a jury acquitted the siblings of the assault,

Daniel faced a 2003 retrial on charges he followed the victim after the

beating and

fabricated police reports to hurt his accuser's credibility. That same year, the Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office cleared Daniel of shooting to death a robbery suspect.

Under pressure from state prosecutors, Daniel resigned from the force in 2004 and gave up his law enforcement certification. As a result, Daniel avoided the possibility of two official misconduct convictions on his record.

His older brother, Rolando Jr., gave up his cop career later that year after a criminal investigation turned up he had not disclosed a grand theft auto charge when he applied for his job with the Hialeah Police Department. Junior is facing charges he robbed a Hialeah bank earlier this year.

So, on November 3, Hialeah voters are probably better off staying home. In fact, they should just boycott the city elections on general principle.